


pieces

by wurin



Series: those who have disappeared [3]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Angst, M/M, Sad with a Happy Ending, Vampire Hunters, Vampire Kim Dongyoung | Doyoung, Vampire Lee Taeyong, Vampires, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:53:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28487868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wurin/pseuds/wurin
Summary: If he has lost Taeyong forever, it’s his fault.
Relationships: Kim Dongyoung | Doyoung/Lee Taeyong
Series: those who have disappeared [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2047937
Comments: 8
Kudos: 84





	pieces

**Author's Note:**

> hello!! this is the last part of the series, so if you haven’t read the parts before, it won’t make much sense!
> 
> i hope you will enjoy it and won’t be disappointed!! please let me know what you think about it!! 💘
> 
> english is not my first language so forgive me if there are mistakes!
> 
> happy new year everyone 💓

Something’s broken. He knows everyone can perceive it. 

Something that everyone can see, can touch, gentle fingertips brushing against it, sometimes becoming harsh, but no one speaks about it, as if it’s not there, as if their eyes see it and at the same time their minds aren’t registering the sight.

Dongyoung does that too. But he’s conflicted. He doesn’t know what he wants, if he wants to speak about it, or if he wants to pretend as if nothing happened. And yet, even if he lives in a lie, he can’t pretend, not when he can’t stop himself from focusing his senses on Taeyong, whenever the other is, whatever he’s doing. He’s always ready to catch each sound or word coming from him, to follow all of his movements in the House, though he barely sees him. 

Taeyong asked him for time, and Dongyoung’s giving it to him, even if it pains him. Even if with each day passing he feels like his body can’t take the pain anymore, as if it’s going to tear itself apart, and Dongyoung can’t do anything about it, he can only grit his teeth and let the pain consume him. It’s his fault, in the end. He can’t blame anyone else, it’s all his fault and he deserves it.

If he could, he’d take all Taeyong’s pain too, each drop of it until the last. It doesn’t matter that he almost can’t bear his own anymore, he’d let his body destroy itself if it meant Taeyong wouldn’t suffer. 

But he can’t, right? He can only wish he could. When he hears Taeyong’s sobs, still too quiet in the silence of the night, when he realises Taeyong hasn’t left his bedroom for days, or when he hears him leave if Dongyoung is near. It’s then that Dongyoung wishes he could do something, that he could brush his fingers against Taeyong’s skin and take all the pain and its warmth away with him, that he could lock himself into his eyes, his golden prison, and feel the pain for the both of them.

It’s been months since that night. Dongyoung doesn’t even count the days anymore, and it still feels like not even a day has passed. The pain hasn’t subsided, his heart keeps clenching on itself harder and harder, and sometimes he’s left breathless. He shouldn’t feel like that, he doesn’t want to feel like that, he doesn’t want to be a human more than a vampire, and yet, he can’t do anything about it, he can’t stop it. Dongyoung doesn’t know if it will ever get better. Some days, when he feels as if he’s suffocating, he prays for everything to stop, other days, he tells himself he deserves all of it and even more, he lets the guilt eat at him from the inside.

The pain just takes, and takes, and takes. Dongyoung doesn’t do anything to stop it, he doesn’t even know if he wants it to stop. He knows he deserves it. He tried to bury the feeling as deep as he could, and yet the hatred he feels for himself is still there, he can reach for it, touch it with his bare hands. At some point it transformed into hatred for humans, for their feelings and for everything that made them human, but it was just a way to forget about its origin, to let his Blood Demon take control and just forget. 

Taeyong was right. It came back at him thousands of times worse.

It will never go away, and he can blame only himself. If he has lost Taeyong forever, it’s his fault.

○

“You’re starving yourself.”

Dongyoung doesn’t answer, not because he doesn’t want to, but because Taeil already knows he is. Even if he denied it, the other wouldn’t believe him, Taeil knows the truth.

“Why are you here?” Taeil asks then, sitting down by his side. Dongyoung has been on the floor near the door of the backyard for hours, since the sun set.

Dongyoung shrugs his shoulders, there isn’t a real reason why he’s there, or maybe there is, he just doesn’t want to feel disappointed once he’ll speak the words out.

“Just because,” he replies, head placed against the wall, knees bent and elbows rested on it. Since the moment he has sat down, his thumb has never stopped spinning the ring around his index finger. 

Taeil doesn’t say anything, and Dongyoung pretends the other’s not there.

He has a reason for both questions and they both lead to one person. Dongyoung just doesn’t want to voice them out, to make them even realer and let his own words hurt him.

Taeil’s the first one who has tried to approach him, to make him speak about the matter, but Dongyoung doesn’t want to. What should he say? They all know what happened, it’s impossible to keep secrets in a house full of vampires, they all know what Taeyong told him, so there’s no need to speak about it.

“You should go out and feed,” Taeil says, voice a whisper, words too soft. 

He doesn’t remember when it was the last time he fed, maybe it’s been more than one month, and yet, he hasn’t felt the hunger not even once. Maybe, the pain takes all the space in his body, not leaving any for everything else.

Dongyoung shakes his head. It doesn’t matter, he won’t die of starvation, he’s an old vampire and old vampires could go even more than a year without feeding. Besides, he has fed so much —more than he should’ve— in the past years, that probably he would be fine for years.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Taeil tells him, he’s an old vampire too. “Only because we can live for longer periods without feeding, it doesn’t mean we have to do it. Even if now you don’t feel it, the strain will come soon.”

Dongyoung doesn’t care. He’s too heartbroken to care about that. 

“I don’t care.”

Taeil laughs, but Dongyoung knows he’s laughing not because he finds his words amusing, he’s laughing because he can’t believe his ears. 

“So Yuta was right,” he says then, and Dongyoung doesn’t know what he’s talking about. “You’ll just starve yourself to death.”

_Maybe._

“I never said that,” he argues back, even if the words seem too weak to be the truth. 

“Yeah, because you don’t speak anymore.”

It’s Dongyoung’s turn to laugh, it’s low, and it makes his chest vibrate. “And what should I say?” he doesn’t want to get angry, he doesn’t want to raise his voice and catch everyone’s attention, so he keeps it down, but he still can feel the fire burning him from the inside. “What should I talk about? How beautiful the weather is? Or about the fact we all don’t have a life anymore, mh? The fact we are neither alive or dead? Tell me, Taeil, tell me what I should talk about.”

Since that night, maybe it’s the first time ever he has spoken so many words, and after getting them out, he feels like he doesn’t have the strength to speak again, as if his voice has drained out.

Taeil takes some time to answer, and when he does, Dongyoung’s not surprised to hear those words. “I just wanted to help,” he tells him, “but I guess you don’t want it.”

And then, just like he arrived, he leaves, in silence. He gets up and walks away.

Taeil’s right. Dongyoung doesn’t want any help. He doesn’t need help if it’s for something he can’t fix. 

_You can’t be forgiven for something you can’t fix_ , Taeyong told him, and Dongyoung has accepted it. He can’t turn back time, he can’t make Taeyong human again, he can’t change what happened, so Taeyong’s right.

If he could fix it, he wouldn’t be on the floor waiting for someone who will never come.

○

If Dongyoung said he doesn’t miss Jisung, he’d lie.

Like everyone else, Jisung knows what happened, knows what Taeyong told him. He knows Dongyoung’s a coward, a liar, someone who doesn’t deserve a family. Even if they weren’t a real family, even if Dongyoung and Taeyong were never really together, and Jisung was already a vampire when he joined the Coven, Dongyoung has always considered the other two his own little family. Somewhere deep in his chest, he knows that he’d die for them, if dying would be the only way to protect them, he’d do it without thinking about it twice. But now, it’s broken, Dongyoung broke their bonds with his actions and his lies, and it’s obvious which side Jisung chose. He can’t blame him because Dongyoug would’ve done the same. And yet, Dongyoung misses him, just like he misses Taeyong, but in a different way. 

Now, he knows it was wrong, he knew back then too, but he just ignored it, hid the thought where it couldn’t reach him. He knows that making Jisung feed through himself was a mistake, that it made the situation even worse. 

Jisung’s real parents were murdered by Vampire Hunters when he was still a kid newly turned. Dongyoung remembers the first time he saw him, he was small and frail, trembling like a leaf in the wind, covered in blood. He thought that Jisung was too young to hunt and feed on his own, so he let him feed through himself, year after year, until Jisung believed he would’ve never needed to kill a human, that it was something Dongyoung could’ve done for him forever. Dongyoung thought that too. It was the way he took care of the other, if Taeyong’s was through gentle words and soft touches, Dongyoung’s was through fresh blood and stern gazes directed to the others for telling Jisung to feed on his own.

At first, Taeyong didn’t say anything. He let Dongyoung do it, maybe because he knew what it meant, or maybe because he also thought Jisung was too young. But then, most of the time they argued, it was always about Jisung. Taeyong didn’t want Jisung to get too used to the fact he didn’t have to kill, and Dongyoung thought that as long as he could’ve prevented Jisung from witnessing the horrors of being a vampire, he would’ve done it. He had already seen enough when his parents were murdered.

Dongyoung knows Taeyong was right. No one more than Taeyong could’ve known, and yet, Dongyoung kept ignoring it, until it was too late. 

Even if later than usual, Jisung has learnt to feed on his own. Dongyoung smells the blood on him when he returns to the Coven House, he hears his and Taeyong’s words, whispered. Dongyoung tries to stop himself from listening, but he can pick their voices even among all the others, and even if he tries to, he’s not able to.

 _How many did you kill?_ Taeyong asks each time Jisung returns back.

 _Two_ or _three_ , it’s always Jisung’s answer. It’s never more than three. Dongyoung should be proud, they’re vampires, it’s what they do. They kill humans to feed and survive. Maybe before, he would’ve been, but now, he doesn’t know what he feels. A part of him screams that he should be the one providing for Jisung, that Jisung shouldn’t go out to kill, instead the other part tells him that Jisung has to learn, that Dongyoung won’t always be there to protect him.

He’s glad Jisung chose Taeyong, even if it means that Jisung doesn’t speak to him, that he doesn’t spare him a glance and that if he can, he leaves as soon as he senses Dongyoung is nearby.

If Dongyoung said he got used to it, he’d lie about that too.

“Jisung hasn’t come back yet,” are the words that alert Dongyoung. They come from the hall on the ground floor. Taeyong’s. Dongyoung knew Jisung was out, but he didn’t realise how long it’s taking him. Once he glances to the window of his bedroom and he sees that the sun has started to peek through the clouds, he knows something’s not right. Jisung always returns to the House hours before the night ends.

“Did he tell you where he went?” Jaehyun asks Taeyong, but he’s not the only one. Youngho is there with them too.

Dongyoung gets up, standing near the closed door. If he opens it, Taeyong will know he’s listening to them and probably, he will leave.

“No.” Taeyong’s worried, he can hear it in his voice. “No, he only said he was going to feed— but Jisung never goes far, and— and he comes back soon after.”

“Shit,” Youngho swears under his breath.

“Something must have happened,” Taeyong keeps saying, he’s scared, “Jisung always tells me everything, if he wanted to stay out more, he would’ve told me for sure.”

“Are you sure he went out alone?”

“Yeah, Chenle is here, all the other kids too.”

Maybe, Taeyong’s wrong. Dongyoung closes his eyes, and then, he expands his senses until they cover the whole House. 

Chenle’s in his own bedroom. Jaemin, Jeno and Renjun are all in Jeno’s bedroom. Mark and Donghyuck are giggling to each other somewhere in the library. His sense backtrack until his own bedroom, everyone’s in the House, only Jisung isn’t.

“I don’t really want to alert the whole House, but we still have to do it.”

As soon as Jaehyun says the words, Dongyoung’s out of his bedroom. The second after, he’s in the hall with the three of them. It’s the first time he sees Taeyong after that night.

Their eyes met. Taeyong’s are shiny with unshed tears. Time stills. Dongyoung feels himself locked into them, into his golden prison, and for only a brief moment, he forgets about everything. It’s just him and Taeyong. But then, Taeyong glances away and he’s back to the present.

“Everyone!” Jaehyun raises his voice, “come here!”

In a matter of seconds, everyone’s in the hall, but no one speaks. Dongyoung puts as much distance as he can between him and Taeyong, not because he wants to, but because he knows it’s the best.

“Jisung’s missing,” Jaehyun speaks once everyone has found a place. From the wall he’s leaning on, Dongyoung scans the room. Not even the night that his Blood Demon was still in control of his body everyone was there. 

“Are you sure?” Kun asks, and even if he’s looking at Jaehyun, it’s Taeyong who answers.

“Yeah, Jisung never stays out so long,” he says, arms crossed against his chest, fingers tight around the sleeve of the hoodie he’s wearing. “I’m sure something happened.”

“Hyung is right,” Chenle speaks, there’s worry in both his eyes and voice, “Jisung never stays out after the sun starts to go up.”

Kun nods, “Okay, then some of us will go out and look for him.”

It’s then that Dongyoung speaks. “I’ll go.”

“Dongyoung—” Taeil tries to reason with him, but with a shake of his head and a look that could kill him if he were still alive, Dongyoung cuts the other off before he can say another word.

“I said that I’ll go.” No one tries to stop him when he pushes himself away from the wall.

The moment after, he’s gone from the House.

○

Dongyoung doesn’t know where Jisung goes to feed, but if Taeyong said he never goes far away from the House, then it must be the clubs near the outskirts of the city.

Jisung isn’t there though. Dongyoung checks once, twice, he even sneaks inside staff-only rooms, he checks each bathroom stall, but there is not even a clue that could suggest Jisung was there at some point of the night. 

After he’s certain Jisung never went to those clubs, he moves to another part of the city where vampires hunt. Even if Dongyoung wishes with everything in his body to find him, Jisung isn’t there either. It’s as if he’s looking for a ghost. 

He moves from a place to another, senses focused everywhere, even on the smallest things, afraid he’d miss something, but it’s like Jisung never went out. It’s like he never put a foot outside the House. Dongyoung senses other vampires, bodies discarded away, the rotten smell, but not Jisung.

And then, in the middle of an empty park surrounded by fog, something clicks together.

It’s not a ghost he’s looking for, and the reason why it feels as if Jisung never left the House is because it’s what actually happened. Jisung never reached the city. Hunters took him before he could. 

Dongyoung’s fast, but he has never been so fast since the day he became a vampire. 

As soon as he stops in the middle of the hall, “Jisung has been captured,” he announces, and even if all his eyes are on him, Dongyoung meets only the ones of a person.

Taeyong falls on his knees, he seems too shocked to speak, silent tears run down his cheeks. Dongyoung wants to get closer and comfort him, tell him he’ll find Jisung, no matter what, but he doesn’t, he stays still and he just watches Jungwoo kneel on the floor by Taeyong’s side and hug him. 

“No,” Taeyong says under his breath, voice broken, “ _my baby_.”

The word is barely whispered, but it feels like Taeyong has screamed it into his ears, it feels like it’s piercing through his heart. And only then, Dongyoung realises what happened. 

Jisung’s missing, and they don’t need someone to tell them he was captured by Hunters. Vampire Hunters capture and kill after. It’s the first time someone of the Coven gets captured, and deep down, even if he knows he shouldn’t, Dongyoung wishes it could’ve been someone else, or that it could’ve been himself. Jisung has just learnt how to feed on his own, he would never be able to fight against Hunters and escape.

Dongyoung takes a step closer to Taeyong, but the look Jungwoo sends him is enough to make him rethink about it. 

He knows he should wait for the others who went out to search for Jisung to come back, to see if they found something that could be useful, but while Dongyoung’s there, wasting time, Jisung is who knows where, maybe being tortured by Hunters because they want to know where their House Coven is, or maybe he’s already dead.

That thought sends a shiver down his back. He doesn’t want to think about that, it can’t happen, Jisung can’t die.

“What?” he hears, and Dongyoung didn’t even realise he had closed his eyes. Once he opens them, Taeyong’s looking at him, and for a brief moment, Dongyoung wishes for something else, he wishes Taeyoung was looking at him not because he has to, but because it’s his choice. “What are you thinking about?” Taeyong asks him, the tears are still on his cheeks, but he doesn’t care about brushing them away.

“Nothing,” he lies. He can’t tell Taeyong what he was thinking about, the other would be destroyed by the thought. “I have to go,” he says, even if Kun, Yuta and Youngho aren’t back yet. 

“No,” Taeyong tells him, still knelt on the floor, fingers closed into fists on his thighs, “you can’t go alone, Dongyoung.”

It’s the way Taeyong says his name. He missed it, he missed it so much that it doesn’t seem real, a figment of his imagination. He looks at Taeyong, lets his eyes catch each detail of the other. His hair is still light, silver, his eyes didn’t change, they’re warm, even when they’re on Dongyoung, and he’s wearing the ring Dongyoung gifted him. Its sight melts something in his chest, in that moment, it’s not cold, frozen like it has been for weeks, the heat makes his fingers tingle, asking him to be interlocked with someone else’s. Dongyoung ignores it, even if it’s difficult, even if the only thing he wants to do is kneel on the floor, wrap his arms around Taeyong and never let go. 

“I’m sorry,” it’s what he says. It’s been a long time since he hasn’t said those words, and they feel foreign on his tongue, as if he’s not the one whispering them. 

“ _Dongyoung_ ,” Taeyong whispers back, new tears fall down on his cheeks. 

He shakes his head, and after a last glance, he leaves, just as fast as he arrived. If Taeyong repeats his name, louder, more desperate, Dongyoung forces himself to ignore it.

Once he’s far enough from the House, he stops, a hand placed on a wall to keep himself up and the other on his chest, fingers gripping his jacket. He knows it’s all in his head, and yet, he can feel his heart beating, quick, too quick, and it feels like the air in his lungs is burning, leaving him breathless.

 _You’re a vampire_ , he tells himself, _stop being weak_. He hits the wall with his fist and even if he doesn’t feel pain, the shock that travels from his knuckles to his arm and then his head is enough to make everything stop. His heart goes back to being dead, rotten and decaying, and his lungs go back to being empty. 

○

Five hearts and five pairs of lungs. 

There are five hearts beating, steady, beat after beat. Lungs filled by oxygen, again and again.

Dongyoung hears them talk to each other.

“We have to leave before his Coven finds us,” one says and the words are enough for Dongyoung to know he’s in the right place.

Another gets up, his heart is the fastest. “We can’t, we have to wait for Lim.”

“Did you forget his Coven is made of twenty-three vampires?” another speaks, “they must be looking for him, we can’t leave now.”

 _I already found you_ , Dongyoung thinks, back leaned against the wall of the building the Hunters are in. It’s old, abandoned, and if it wasn’t for the side door, Dongyoung would’ve never stopped to check it. The side door is too new compared to the rest of the building, and even if there’s a chain that holds it close to make it look like no one can go inside, the lock on it is open, which means that someone entered and couldn’t close it from the inside.

The side alley is empty, even if the sun shines bright, and it’s eerily quiet. The area is full of abandoned buildings, almost as if time stopped and everyone disappeared. 

“They will come soon,” the fourth person says. Dongyoung knows he could kill them in a matter of seconds, and yet, he’s waiting. They’re too few, if Jisung is there, there should be more than five Hunters, even if Jisung’s a young vampire, he’s still a vampire, stronger than just a bunch of humans.

“We’ll be ready,” a different Hunter says, Dongyoung can hear the smirk in the voice.

There’s something he doesn’t understand. One says they should leave, another says they have to wait and another says they’re ready. Their words don’t make sense. If they want to capture all members of their Coven, they’d need many more Hunters, and only five waiting for them is like asking to die before they can even bat their eyelashes.

Something’s missing. A detail that will make the difference, but that Dongyoung can’t see, no matter how hard he searches for it.

It’s not his first encounter with Hunters, but they didn’t live long enough to tell the story, actually, they stopped living as soon as Dongyoung set his eyes on them and understood what they were.

“The vampire’s young,” someone speaks. _Jisung_. “But it’s the only way we have to capture the other.”

The missing piece. Dongyoung’s the other. They captured Jisung to get to Dongyoung.

Taeyong was right, he was _so_ right. He told him one day he would’ve been too intoxicated to realise Hunters were on him. His control taken away by the Blood Demon and senses unfocused while Hunters followed him.

They know where the Coven House is, they know everything and once again, it’s Dongyoung’s fault. It’s always his fault. If Hunters will attack the House, the others will die because of him. 

He should go back to the House, alert everyone, but at the same time, he can’t leave, Jisung is a few meters away from him, waiting for someone to rescue him, Dongyoung can’t leave him alone. If he leaves, Jisung could die, but then it would mean all the others would be safe. If he doesn’t, Jisung will live, but the others could die. Taeyong could die.

Dongyoung grits his teeth, fingers closing into fists, skin cut by his nails. He can’t choose. He doesn’t want to sacrifice Jisung to save Taeyong, but he doesn’t want to sacrifice Taeyong to save Jisung either. Maybe, if he’s fast enough he can save both.

He can kill the Hunters inside the building in a second, the time it takes to close his eyes and open them again, and then, he’ll run as fast as he can to get to the House and alert the others. It’s the only way to save everyone.

Dongyoung nods to himself, he can do it.

Inside the building, he doesn’t even register the Hunters’ faces, he kills the first, and then, after a moment, all the five Hunters are on the floor, dead, a hand-sized hole in their chests.

Jisung’s there, tied to a chair and passed out. His head is hanging, and when Dongyoung kneels on the floor in front of him, he sees his face is covered by blood. Even if the wounds are gone thanks to the quick healing, the blood is all there, on his face, his hoodie, on the floor. It’s dried, and Dongyoung wonders how long he has been there, waiting for someone to come.

“Jisung-ah,” he whispers under his breath, fingers soft on the other’s face, “Jisung-ah, wake up.”

He moves his other hand to tear the tape around Jisung’s ankles, but as soon as his fingers brush against the material, it’s like he’s burnt by it, as if there’s a fire ready to melt his flesh away from his bones. Dongyoung hisses, and when he inspects the tape, he realises it’s made with silver.

“Motherfuckers,” he swears under his breath, even if he’s not surprised. It must be why Jisung is passed out, the silver on his bare skin must have drained him out.

“Jisung-ah,” he says again, pressing his hand on the other’s cheek, shaking his shoulder too, he doesn’t want to move him around too much, afraid the silver could burn him even more than it already has. The skin of his ankles is almost black, and his wrists tied behind the chair must be in the same state.

“Please, wake up.” It’s with a harder shake of his shoulder that Jisung starts to wake up. First, he opens his eyes, blinking repeatedly, then once he realises he’s tied, he starts to move, but Dongyoung keeps him still.

“Don’t move,” he whispers, “the silver will burn you even more.”

“Hyung?” Jisung asks, voice low and broken, “you’re here?”

Jisung looks surprised, as if he can’t believe his eyes, as if he’s dreaming.

“I’m here,” Dongyoung reassures him, threading his fingers through his hair to move some strands away from his eyes. “Hyung is here, you’re safe.”

And then, Jisung must realise something because his eyes become wide and the surprise is replaced by fear.

“No— no—hyung, you shouldn’t be here—”

“It’s okay, they’re dead,” Donyoung tries to tell him, but Jisung doesn’t seem like he’s listening to his words, he keeps trashing his body on the chair, trying to make the tape loose, but it’s vain, and it’s only hurting him more. 

“Hyung— they’re— they want you,” he tells him, eyes wide and full of tears, shaking his head, “they want your Blood Demon.”

No one’s there. All the hearts he could hear stopped beating as soon as his hand went through the Hunters’ chests.

“Jisung,” he says, voice firm, fingers gently gripping the other’s chin to stop him from looking around himself, looking for something he only is aware of, “no one’s here.”

But now, the seed has been planted. What if someone is there and Dongyoung can’t sense them? Hunters are humans, even if they know how to make their hearts beat slower and they don’t breathe, Dongyoung would still hear them, even if it’s just a single heartbeat. He’d hear it.

Jisung shakes his head again, eyes focused on something behind Dongyoung, but when he turns around, nothing is there. 

Something’s wrong. They have to leave.

Dongyoung looks around the room until his eyes land on a piece of metal placed on the floor, its end is jagged, and even if it’s not much big, it’s the only thing that could break the tape.

“Hyung,” Jisung whimpers once Dongyoung starts to move its end on the tape, “hyung, you need to leave.”

Dongyoung doesn’t listen to him, he just keeps moving the metal on the tape, and even if slowly, it’s breaking apart. “I won’t leave you here,” he tells him, resolute. It doesn’t matter anymore, if someone’s there in the building, they know Dongyoung’s there too, he will worry about them once they will be face to face. He can’t run and leave Jisung alone, not when he’s so close to rescuing him.

“Taeyong’s waiting for you. I can’t go back without you.” The words leave his lips before he can stop himself.

“For hyung too,” Jisung tells him, leaning forward, “he will never forgive you if you get captured.”

Dongyoung chuckles, amused. “He will never forgive me if he finds out I left you here.” At that, Jisung doesn’t fight back anymore and lets Dongyoung work on the tape.

“This will hurt,” Dongyoung tells Jisung once the tape is broken into two parts, but the rest is still attached to Jisung’s skin and Dongyoung has to tear it away.

Jisung nods, “Do it.”

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, and then, even if it burns his fingers, he holds it tight and tears it away.

Jisung screams, but Dongyoung presses a hand on his mouth, getting up and guiding Jisung’s head against his abdomen. Jisung screams against it, the shout muted by his clothes. “It’s okay,” he says, caressing the back of his neck, “it will go away soon.”

As soon as the skin of his ankles starts to heal, Jisung quietens, and only then, Dongyoung moves his hands away. Jisung’s eyes are full of tears once again, but they don’t have time to stop, even if it’s painful.

Though the tape around his wrists is so tight that Dongyoung has to be even slower at cutting it not to graze Jisung’s skin and hurt him more than he already is.

“Hyung.”

Dongyoung makes a sound in the back of his throat, focused on the tape.

“Hyung, someone’s here.”

At the words, he stops moving the piece of metal. Jisung’s right, once he expands his senses on the whole building and its perimeter outside, he can sense someone.

“Nine people,” he says, and then, he smells the silver of their weapons. “Hunters.”

“What do we do?” Jisung asks him, while Dongyoung goes back to work on the tape.

“Nothing,” he answers, “they don’t know what happened and we will be gone before they get here.”

Jisung doesn’t say anything, but Dongyoung knows the other’s not convinced by his words. Dongyoung’s not too. At least, not completely, but there isn’t another way.

The time they have is not enough. Dongyoung realises that too late. He realises it when the Hunters are a step away from the room they’re in and the tape has just been torn apart. He doesn’t even have the time to come up with something.

The Hunters are there. They’re face to face, guns ready to shoot silver bullets on them. The bullets won’t kill them, but it will be enough to stop them. If Dongyoung were alone, he would’ve risked getting shot, but he can’t, not when Jisung’s there with him. Not when he’d get distracted thinking he has to protect Jisung first.

“The savage vampire,” a Hunter says, he’s smirking, and his smugness annoys Dongyoung like nothing else.

Dongyoung scoffs, throwing the piece of metal away, it lands on the floor with a clang, and the sound is louder than the Hunters’ hearts.

“Fuck off,” Dongyoung tells him through his teeth. He needs to buy time.

The Hunter laughs, and Dongyoung doesn’t need a confirmation to know he’s their Leader. He’s the one with more weapons, two guns strapped to his waist and a sword on his back. It’s the first time he sees a Hunter with a sword, everyone knows that if a vampire gets as close as needed to use a sword to fight, then they’re seconds away from being killed.

“I thought you wouldn’t have come anymore,” he says, getting a step closer to him and Jisung. Dongyoung flashes his fangs as a warning, but it’s like the man doesn’t care, or he’s too reckless.

Dongyoung grips Jisung’s arm and helps him get up from the chair, he’s weak, Dongyoung knows, but they can’t stay there much longer, not when there are fifteen guns pointed at them. One bullet through their head would take too much to heal and in the meanwhile the Hunters could take them who knows where, where no one will find them, and then, kill them.

Not everyone knows how to kill vampires, only Hunter families do, and they keep the knowledge a secret, passing it from member to member, but never to people who aren’t in the Family. If everyone knew how to do it, they wouldn’t be needed and wouldn’t get filthy rich.

Dongyoung knows how to kill vampires too. It’s not a wooden or silver stick through their hearts, like many believe, a vampire’s heart is dead, still, it could be taken out and the vampire wouldn’t feel anything. It’s not cutting the head either, if it happens, the severed flesh can regenerate and reattach the head to the body. It’s fire. The only way to kill vampires is by burning them. The fire never stops to burn, and at the same time, a vampire never stops to heal, until the strain is too much. At some point, after days of torture and without blood, the healing stops and it’s when the fire consumes the body, until only ashes remain.

Dongyoung has heard the screams once and he doesn’t want to hear them ever again.

The Hunter in front of him is wearing his family crest on his jacket, but Dongyoung doesn’t recognise it.

“I think you don’t know me.” Dongyoung’s already imagining his hand through his chest, heart fisted between his fingers. “I’m Lim Jiwon, and you’re Kim Dongyoung, right?”

Dongyoung doesn’t know how the Hunter knows his name, but he doesn’t reply back, even if he doubts the other’s asking for a confirmation.

After he points at Jisung with a hand covered by a leather glove, “And he’s Park Jisung,” he says, and the smirk isn’t gone from his face yet. Dongyoung wants to tear it away with his fangs.

Contrary to Dongyoung, Jisung reacts when his name is said, it’s a slight jerk of his head, but if Dongyoung caught it, he’s sure the man did too.

“So I’m right.”

Dongyoung tightens the grip around Jisung’s arm. If they want to escape, they’d first have to kill all the Hunters in the room, and Jisung’s still too weak, he can barely stand up, he wouldn’t be able to kill a Hunter who has trained their whole life to learn all the ways to defeat a vampire.

It’s then that Dongyoung makes a promise to himself, if he and Jisung come out of there alive, he has to teach all the kids how to defend themselves from Hunters and how to kill someone who knows how to kill them back, so they will never find themselves in a similar situation.

“You’re not,” Dongyoung says, voice low and fangs shown, “and you’ll be dead soon.”

The Hunter laughs, but Dongyoung doesn’t laugh with him. If he kills their Leader first, the other Hunters will be shocked and it will give Dongyoung enough time to kill all of them too.

That’s what Dongyoung tries to do. He moves, quick, but the Hunters form a shield around their Leader, and the only way to get to him is by shredding the others to pieces. 

Both his hands close around two hearts, pulsing under his fingers, and when he tightens the grip, the Hunters fall to the floor. He does it again, and again, but he’s not fast enough.

At first he doesn’t realise what’s happening, even if the sound explodes in his ears. It’s when he lifts his hand to his forehead that he realises. A silver bullet pierced through his head, and after, he falls, as if his legs stopped working all of a sudden.

Jisung’s screaming, but Dongyoung can’t decipher his words. His body has been devoid of blood for a long time, and it’s the reason why just a bullet makes him feel like he’ll pass out soon, already too weak.

He slides on the floor until he reaches the Hunter, and then, he wraps both his hands around his ankle, as tight as he can manage. With the last drop of energy he has left, forehead pressed against the dirty floor, “Run!” he screams, even if his own voice scratches his throat. “Jisung, run!”

Dongyoung doesn’t see Jisung running away, but he hears him, and it’s enough. He can let himself go because Jisung’s safe.

It’s a second bullet in his head that makes him pass out.

○

The burn is what wakes him up. His whole body feels on fire, but when he opens his eyes and looks down, there aren’t flames melting his flesh from his bones. But the burn doesn’t go away. There’s silver tape wrapped around his naked chest, it’s everywhere, around his neck, his wrists and his ankles, and it burns him, even if he stays still. The skin of his chest is black, charred, and it stopped healing.

Dongyoung doesn’t know how long has passed, he’s not in that abandoned building anymore, the room he’s in is darker, as if it were underground, its walls are black and there’s a smell that permeates the air, the smell of something burnt, but it doesn’t come from his own skin, it comes from the room itself, as if the smell mixed with the walls and the floor.

Then, he understands. The walls aren’t painted black, they’re completely burnt. It’s where the Hunters kill the vampires they capture. The floor is black too, and when he moves his naked feet on it, even if slightly because the tape doesn’t let him, the ashes move too and reveal the actual light color of the floor.

Jisung said the Hunters want his Blood Demon, but it’s something not even Dongyoung can control, if it comes out while Dongyoung’s there, he’d kill all of them in a matter of seconds. His Blood Demon’s cruel, when Dongyoung’s in that state, he doesn’t spare anyone and he doesn’t feel any kind of pain, he actually doesn’t feel anything besides the thirst for blood, so it won’t matter that there’s silver tape wrapped around his whole body, it won’t stop him from getting himself free, even if he’ll burn himself.

Maybe, it’s the only way he has to survive, but it’s been so long since his Blood Demon came out, and Dongyoung’s not sure he will be able to go back to himself if it does, he has repressed it for the longest time ever, he doesn’t know what will happen when it will be out, if he will be able to restrain it again.

He’d kill all the Hunters, but at what price? What if it takes control of his body and never lets it go. Dongyoung loses his touch with reality when it happens, everything’s blurred and mixed together, he could kill thousands of people and not realise it. He pinned Taeyong against a wall because he believed the other were too human, and Dongyoung doesn’t want to come back to himself and see the fear inside the others’ eyes while looking at him.

“You’re awake.”

The voice cuts the silence in the room, making Dongyoung lift his head. He didn’t hear Lim Jiwon entering the room, his heart’s beating and yet, he didn’t hear him. It must be the bullets, Dongyoung tells himself, or the silver, his senses aren’t as sharp as usual, as sharp as they should be.

Dongyoung doesn’t answer, he just moves his lips up to show his fangs. He wants to drain all of Lim Jiwon’s blood out of his body, bite down on his neck and kill him slowly, until there’s not even a drop of blood left. It doesn’t matter that his blood’s poisoned, that there’s silver in it, something Hunters do not to let vampires drink from them, but Dongyoung doesn’t care, he’d still drink all of his blood and give him a death he’d be the most ashamed of.

“You really did something back there,” he keeps speaking and Dongyoung really considers the idea of letting his Blood Demon out. “But those were disposable.”

Dongyoung scoffs, even if the movement of his head makes the tape rub against his neck, burning his skin more than it already is. He keeps the groan trapped in his throat, and “What do you want?” he asks, as if he doesn’t already know.

Lim Jiwon chuckles, walking closer to the centre of the room, where Dongyoung is, but not too close. He’s afraid, after all he doesn’t know anything about Dongyoung’s Blood Demon, not when Dongyoung could release it and if he can control it or not. It’s the only real advantage he has on the Hunter.

“Congratulations,” he says, clapping his hands once, “you’re the most famous vampire among us, each Hunter I know would pay to be where I am, to see you tied to a chair unable to move.”

Dongyoung lifts a corner of his lips, amused, “They wouldn’t live much after to tell the story.”

The Hunter laughs, deep, and the sound annoys Dongyoung, even more than the tape on his bare skin.

“I want to know more about your… other side,” then, he tells him, “I’ve never met a vampire like you.”

Dongyoung doesn’t know how the man has found out about his Blood Demon, but it must’ve been during one of those nights Dongyoung wasn’t in control of his body and actions, those nights he can’t remember anything about.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

It doesn’t matter if he speaks or if he doesn’t, in the end, they will kill him, and he won’t say a word about his Blood Demon.

The man laughs again. Dongyoung closes his hands into fists until his arms start to shake.

“The silver hurts, right?” Lee Jiwon asks him, glancing at the tape on his chest, a twisted smile on his lips, and then, he takes a gun out. “What about other bullets?”

If the Hunter thinks he will get answers with his silver, he’s a fool. The pain brought by the silver is just a small pinch compared to the one he feels in his chest, the one that has carved into his heart until nothing remained, and it just kept going, carving into his chest, into his head, into each part of his body, leaving a ghost of it.

The man can put dozens of bullets through his head, he can wrap tape around his whole body, he can make him drink silver, and yet, the pain will still be bearable, he could handle it for days, weeks, months. Nothing would break him like Taeyong’s words did, nothing would tear him to pieces like Taeyong’s absence does.

Nothing can hurt him like the thought Taeyong may never forgive him does. That he won’t hold Taeyong close to himself ever again, brush his fingertips against his naked skin, kiss his lips, feel his fangs on his neck, or just hear his voice whisper sweet words to him.

“I’d love them,” he answers, a smile on his lips matching the one of the other’s, “I’d love all the silver in the world and all the fire you can produce.”

It’s quick, but something still flashes into the man’s eyes, surprise, or fear, maybe a mix of both. He must think Dongyoung’s crazy, asking for something that’d hurt him, that’d kill him.

And then, a bullet pierces through his shoulder. If he weren’t taped to the chair, Dongyoung would’ve toppled over himself, but he doesn’t. It hurts, it burns him deep inside and yet, he just grits his teeth and meets his eyes with the other’s.

Another comes, and then another, again and again, until Dongyoung loses the count, until his whole body feels on fire, hot, too hot. Maybe death would be better, but Dongyoung just keeps gritting his teeth and bears it. Even if at some point, he wishes he could pass out and don’t feel anything.

The bullets make him trash on the chair and the movements make the tape rub on his skin, Dongyoung wouldn’t be surprised to see his whole body burnt black.

Lim Jiwon laughs, too loud in his ears, sound echoing in the room, and Dongyoung’s on the verge of letting his Blood Demon go, lash it out until each Hunter in the building is dead.

“Tell me about it!” the man screams, getting closer, gun pointed to his head. “Tell me or I’ll fill your head with all the bullets left.”

 _Do it_ , Dongyoung almost tells him, so he will pass out and not feel like flames are lapping at his insides.

The gun is pressed down on his skin even harder, and after, he hears a gunshot, but it doesn’t come from Lim Jiwon’s gun, it comes from afar, somewhere in the building. And then, there’s another, and another, until he can hear only gunshots and screams.

Lim Jiwon turns around, running towards the door of the room. “What’s happening?!” he screams at someone.

“They’re here!” he hears through the haze in his head, through the pain spreading on his skin, “The vampires are here! Run!”

 _They’re here_ , he tells himself, _you’re safe._

The Hunter disappears outside, but Dongyoung’s certain someone of the Coven will kill him before he can even try to escape. He hopes it will hurt, that he will regret what he did and beg for his life to be spared, and that whoever will kill him won’t be gentle, that they’ll be as vicious as they can.

Then, someone enters the room, not Hunters, their hearts aren’t beating and Dongyoung smiles to himself, relieved.

Once the tape is broken off by hands he can’t recognise, he falls on his side on the floor, the walls of the room feel like they’re closing on him, but he just knows Taeyong’s close, even if his senses are going haywire. The moment after, he feels fingers on his face, delicate, and Dongyoung doesn’t have to check to know that it’s Taeyong.

“ _Doie_ ,” he whispers, and it’s been so long that Dongyoung hasn’t heard Taeyong calling him that, it’s been so long that once he hears it he almost doesn’t understand the other’s talking to him.

“Dongyoung,” he says against Dongyoung’s forehead. Only then, he realises Taeyong’s hands are cupped around his face, and that Taeyong knelt on the floor, crouched down on himself. “You’re alive.”

Dongyoung hears the tears in the other’s voice, and after, he feels them on his skin, cold compared to Taeyong’s warm touch. He’s too weak to speak, but it doesn’t matter, he doesn’t need to speak, he just wants Taeyong to never let him go, ever again.

Taeyong sobs quietly on his skin, fingers gentle and lips soothing on it, making him forget the feel of his burnt flesh, and Dongyoung can only think about how much he missed Taeyong, he missed him so _fucking_ much and he was terrified by the thought he was going to die before Taeyong could’ve had the chance of forgiving him. Before he could hear those words. _I forgive you. I forgive you, Dongyoung_. He knew there was a possibility he would’ve never heard them, but if he died, he would’ve never known.

“You’re not dead,” Taeyong says, and Dongyoung doesn’t know if he’s trying to reassure himself, to erase the thought Dongyoung could’ve been dead, or if he’s telling it to Dongyoung.

 _No, I’m not dead_ , Dongyoung wants to tell him, but he doesn’t even know if his eyes are open, if he were human, he would’ve passed out long before the others arrived.

“I thought you were dead,” he whispers, and maybe at some point, Dongyoung thought he were too.

Then, he feels Taeyong’s lips on his, wet by salty tears. “I forgive you,” Taeyong says on Dongyoung’s lips, and then, he repeats the words again and again, until they become a second skin. “I can’t live without you, Dongyoung.”

The words sound like a dream. Maybe, he passed out and it’s all happening in his head. But then, he sees Taeyong. His eyes were closed, but he’s seeing him now, light hair tickling his skin, eyes locked with his, and he’s so beautiful that it can’t be a dream. Dongyoung can’t dream, and even if he could, dreams would never reach Taeyong’s real beauty.

“I love you,” are the first words he speaks, barely audible, but he knows that Taeyong catches them anyway. “Don’t leave me, please.”

A sob louder than the others slips through Taeyong’s lips, fingers on his cheeks pressed down harder, as if the other’s afraid Dongyoung would be the one to leave, but Dongyoung has always been there, waiting. He never left. “I love you too,” he murmurs, voice soft, “I won’t— I won’t leave you.”

After hearing those words, Dongyoung feels at ease, all the pain he has felt until then is gone, disappeared with a snap of fingers, all the despair forgotten. Taeyong’s love is back, taking all the space in his heart, spreading to his whole body, and it’s the only thing that matters, filling all the empty spaces carved by the pain. It’s the only feeling Dongyoung wants, even if he’s a vampire he doesn’t care, not anymore. He believed that being in love hurt, but it’s the only thing that still makes him feel alive, and he doesn’t want to stop feeling that way, not if it’s Taeyong who makes him feel like that.

“Let’s just go home, mh?” Taeyong whispers, a soft laugh accompanying the words. “We will be fine there.”

Dongyoung nods, even if he’s not sure he can stand up.

“Jisungie is waiting for you.”

And then, he feels hands on his body, but they don’t hurt him, they’re soothing, gentle and Dongyoung almost feels like he could fall asleep. He doesn’t, not because he’s a vampire, but because he’s afraid everything will slip through his fingers when he’ll open his eyes again, afraid Taeyong’s words will be erased. So he keeps his eyes on Taeyong for the whole time, and he thinks that nothing else matters if he has Taeyong by his side, he can accept everything. He can accept Taeyong’s humanity and all the emotions they both feel, even if they’re vampires.

If Taeyong’s with him, Dongyoung can be himself, not human, not vampire, just Dongyoung.

 _We will be fine there_ , Taeyong said, and Dongyoung believes it with his decaying and rotten heart that’s full of love.

**Author's Note:**

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